What not to wear to the sevens

It’s that time of year when people will call us buzzkills for not enjoying having our streets extra-clogged with vomit and having all of our female friends feel extra unsafe on the streets because of all the douchecanoes who think that because they’re wearing a costume they can harass with impunity.

But we’re not buzzkills, really! And to prove that, we’ve put our heads together and come up with some Wellington-inspired ideas for your Sevens costumes.

“Wear a beard, flat-cap, expensive-looking thrift-store-style garb, bandolier of craft-beer bottles, and a lurid pink Joanna M-sized lipstick kiss. Don’t go to any games. If anyone asks, you were in a Wellingtonista costume.”

Just don’t do blackface, okay? And don’t harass people in the street. What are your costume ideas?

Joanna McLeod

Joanna McLeod has started calling herself the Empress of the Internet because she can. As well as wrangling the other site contributors and Getting Shit Done, she likes to eat, drink and write in equal amounts. Yes, she would love to be invited along to your event in order to do those things. Joanna's also the best person to talk to if you're interested in advertising on the site.

Wellington person

I just wanted to say that
a) Enzo is now clean shaven. I can’t even comprehend what this means.
b) ‘douchecanoe’ – brilliant!

Seamonkey Madness

Wait, just to clarify: is that douche-canoe (as in the rowy, paddly kind); or douche-cano (as in the lava/magma/ash kind)??

Both are quite spiffy, but the douche-cano is just all kinds of awesome.

Joanna

Douchecanoes (which is what I meant) paddle down the street erupting their douchery all over everything out of their douchecanos.

Paula Warren

I’ve watched a lot of sevens costumes in recent years, both on the streets and in the trains. Some make up for the vomit. Others are another aesthetic assault.

My tips on what not to wear would be:
1. Anything that will make you die of heat stroke. I watched a man on a train one afternoon dressed as some sort of animal, and he had almost expired from the heat before he even got to Wellington, with the costume only half on.
2. Anything that can’t cope with a Wellington windy southerly. Dying of cold isn’t quite as bad as heat stroke, but your tarzan costume isn’t going to look very good with a coat over the top or goosebumps all over. And it will help the rest of us if it stays on.
3. Anything that involves very short shorts on average NZ men. And while I wouldn’t want to encourage too much body consciousness, a wee bit would be a help to some of those blokes out there who have forgotten that they have packed in 30 years of bad food and excessive beer.
4. Things you can walk in. It’s a long way up that ramp…

Michael Hudson-Doyle

“Anything that involves very short shorts on average NZ men.”

I know I’ve only been here for 5 years, but I *think* this problem is more widespread than the 7s?